Eberron

Eldrin looked around for his purse. It was so light that he had trouble finding it these days. “How about hitting the pits tonight?” Rod grunted his approval. Eldrin took a long pull on his whiskey before offering the rest to Rod. The boar slurped the rest up and then bashed the clay jar with his head. “Oy, I was going to use that again!” Rod stared at Eldrin and then farted. “Ugh, you stink. C’mon, let’s go.” Eldrin and Rod sauntered over to the underground district of Pylas Maradal. When they arrived at the fighting pits, the crowd fanned out like flames around the foul, stinky pair, leaving them a wide berth. Heading over to the 2-man tag-out battle arena, he found the Valen brothers again, this time being challenged by two…foreigners. A funny pair too…a huge looking warforged and a short dark-skinned gnome. The odds were 2 to 1 against them, and Eldrin decided that was good enough to bet all he had and hopefully put off working for his whiskey for another week.

When he went to place his bet, he heard someone say “Phew…perhaps we should set up or own fighting ring where we won’t have to deal with this riffraff.” It was Artas, a well-known landlord who liked to parade his wealth in everyone’s face. Eldrin felt a burp coming on, so he turned and burped in his mouth and then blew it right in Artas’s face. Eldrin then turned and placed his bet as Artas snarled some obscenities before Eldrin made his way back to the ring.

The fight was underway, and the small gnome was thrown into the ring by the hulking warforged. He and the Valen brother (it was so hard to tell them apart) began testing each other, neither landing a hit for a long time. The Valen launched a bramble arrow, but he missed the gnome, and the gnome tried to fling the brambles back at the Valen, but he missed as well. This went on for a time until the Valen got stuck in one of the briars that were on the field and he tripped and fell. The gnome pounced on him and was able to get first blood, and he started wailing on the Valen, who managed to free himself eventually and tag out. Though the gnome wasn’t even scratched yet, he tagged out as well, and the warforged charged the second Valen. He fought ferociously and his blows were tremendous. The Valen was looking beat when he pulled out a poisoned dagger managed to strike the warforged in the calf. Though the warforged shook it off quickly, it seemed to take a bit out of him. Still, the warforged pressed his advantage and it was soon clear that Valen could not make it back to tag out. The warforged looked to the crowd. “NO MERCY!” Eldrin shouted, and he and many others gave the thumbs-down. To the Valen’s horror, the warforged jumped up and fell face-first right onto his opponent, crushing the life out of him. “NO!” shouted the other Valen, and he and his two friends all rushed out and attacked the warforged at once. The gnome rejoined the the warforged, and the two made short work of the battered Valen and his friends. Eldrin cheered and Rod wildly stamped about. As Eldrin went to collect his winnings, he again saw Artas at the table, cursing about losing the bet. Artas shrieked as he discovered that his purse was missing, and he now owed the bookies 1700 gold! Eldrin laughed in his face, and he and Rod immediately headed out to the bar to spend their unearned winnings.

The Storm Chasers set sail once again, with the ship fund replenished and the boat repaired from the storm they had encountered at sea. They all had such a successful time at Pylas Maradal that they decided to seek a similar fortune in Taer Valaestas, the capital of Valenar. At Taer Valaestas, the most prestigious challenge was a men vs. monster challenge, so naturally the Storm Chasers went there. As Pippin, May’m, Korrash, and ED made their way into the coliseum, Korrash inspected their surroundings. It was not long before he noticed a few tell-tale mounds of dirt. “Careful…there are burrowers.” Sure enough, the ground beneath them started moving, and the crowds were going crazy. “I believe in you guys! I know you won’t get eaten, even though everyone else did!” shouted an elf boy.
Out from beneath burst a brown dragon. He ferociously attacked the party, tearing at them with his claws and his devastating poisonous breath. Though the party was battered and bloodied, Pippin and May’m were able to help them come back from behind, and as they gained momentum the dragon was unable to recover. In the end, the Storm Chasers had made a big name for themselves in Valenar, and when they hit the bars everyone cheered them and offered them free rounds. In their revelry, the party started parading the dragon’s head around the bar, and everyone formed a massive conga line.

The party had just finished stopping a Xoriat invasion in the Deep Mines. We recovered 4 large Khyber shards for our ship, and so we got a ride on the lightning rail back to our ship in Korranberg. While sitting down for a nice meal, May’m noticed the faint smell of a deadly poison in our food. Fortunately she discovered this before we ate, and the party was able to capture the waiter that did the poisoning. Unfortunately he was just a pawn that was paid by Billy, a House Orien royal also on the train.

We tracked the royal back to his fancy car backed with armed Orien and Tharashk guards. Zane and May’m tried talking with Billy, but he was being a pain in the ass. Not wanting to just let him off the hook for what he tried to do, the party drugged Billy, took him as a hostage, and hijacked the engine car of the train to escape.

The party dropped the train off somewhere outside of Korranberg and sneaked into the city, hoping to deliver Billy to House Lyrandar as a wanted criminal. Much to our surprise, Lyrandar wanted nothing to do with the capture of a nobleman from such a powerful house, despite his involvement in previous attacks on Lyrandar ships. With nowhere else to turn with our hostage, the party started making its way to its ship only to be cornered by Tharashk and Orien guards.

The session ended as the party took out the first wave of Tharashk guards.

The team nearly freezes to death and Zane proves to be racist.

Even Pippin’s wings looked cold. They fluttered sporadically amongst the lingering puffs that betrayed the team’s increasing wear. Frost had started to creep, in delicate lace-like patterns up ED’s torso as he trudged upwards. Collectively, they braced themselves as another skin stinging gust whipped around the brae. May’m’s leg muscles burned and she pulled her scarf up to cover her wind bitten face. The icy blast never slowed… and suddenly, the piercing gale swept unnaturally around the Storm Chasers, culminating into a roaring, hostile air elemental.

“I’m so proud of it; this is some of my best work yet! What do you guys think?” Oriana’s face beamed as she slapped her article on the table. Korrash picked up the article and as he read it, he chuckled several times. “I think it is great Oriana!” “Did you get my joke about the bugbear and the banana?” “Did I! That was hilarious!” In their excitement Korrash hugged Oriana, who started blushing, but as Korrash held on a little too long Oriana clammed up. Korrash released her, and blushing, he stammered “Yeah…I think it was great…” He quickly dashed down to his quarters.

The rest of the party sat mildly stunned from the awkward display and sexual tension lingering in the air until May’m and Zane picked up the paper off the table. After a few minutes Zane gave May’m a “Really?” look, and he whispered “This doesn’t make much sense.” May’m nodded and looked at Oriana. “I think you’ve spent too long in the wizard’s tower and not long enough in the pressroom. Your trouble is that you need to remember your audience. This is full of puns and references that only gnomes would understand. And I don’t exactly see why a train derailing is a laughing matter.”

Oriana looked hurt for a second, but then a twinkle came in her eye and eagerly she asked “Lady May’m? Will you teach me and be my editor? I really want to get better, and I know you would be a great teacher!” May’m stared directly into her eyes, but not sensing any malice, she gave her assent. After a long discussion about the party name that lasted into the night, May’m and Oriana came up with the following headline:

LIGHTNINGTRAINDERAILSSTORMCHASERSSAVESTHEDAYDHAKAANIREVOLUTIONARYBROUGHT TO JUSTICE

Pippin was able to shrug off his filth fever with the aid of The Doctor and the party argued about what to do with the Rat King. After taking a vote, the party turned him in to the Sharn Guard for a hefty reward. With that, the group set sail in their newly renovated ship.

Because the ship is fairly small, its range is limited by how much food and other supplies it can hold. With a full crew, the ship can hold supplies for 4 days of travel and we can scavenge for further days worth of supplies on the ocean. We were able to safely reach Trolanport, where we stopped to inquire about elemental power sources. We were told that a ship like ours would require 3 large Khyber shards, bound with elementals (preferably wind or water for a galleon).

The party set out from Trolanport and immediately was set upon by two storms. The first blew us off course, but the second filled our sails and took us quickly to our next destination: Korranberg. We didn’t do much in Korranberg itself, but we heard about a potential wind elemental sighting north in the Seawall Mountains. Since we were relatively close, we hopped aboard the lightning rail, heading north to Zolanberg.

Another investigation of Darius’ former compound revealed a secret passage that led to a bathroom stall in the Sharn Lightning Rail depot past the customs and security checkpoints. After a brief and somewhat fruitless interrogation of Darius and Shadow, the party turned Darius, Shadow, and the confiscated Blood Sugar for a whopping 2000 gold pieces. Having decided they had stockpiled enough, Zane split the money between the group, most of whom bought reagents for Pippin to imbue their weapons with magic.

The still-unnamed party discussed their future options and decided that they would press on towards the Lhazaar Principalities and Tempest’s secret hideout, but just as they concluded, the ship’s doctor came running and shouted “The ship is under attack!”. The party rushed back to find Eran and Squee fighting against a large group of wererats. A battle was joined, and Eran and Squee held them off the ship by fighting on the gangplanks while the party took them out from the rear. Each wererat was cut down, but Eran was hurt, and Shaelyn got bit and contracted Filth Fever. Notably, Squee remained untouched, living up to his reputation from the Blood Sugar Bar battle.

Shaelyn went to see the ship’s doctor as the rest of the party licked its wounds and cleaned up the mess. After some experimental treatments, Shaelyn seemed to fully recover. Not wanting to be caught off guard again, the party decided to send Shaelyn, Korrash, and Pippin out to do some reconnaissance while the rest of the party stayed and guarded the ship. The recon team asked around, discovering that their assailants were part of the Filthy Fang Gang, but not much was known about them. After a brief search of the area, Korrash was able to pick up their tracks, which of course led down the sewers. Shaelyn lit a torch while Korrash led the party just out of range of the torchlight. After some distance, Korrash noticed a scurrying behind them. The team ducked around an offshoot pipeline as a huge swarm of rats passed them, skittering and making filthy sounds. Pippin found a gizmo in the water and pocketed it, but as the team resumed it’s search, the sound of rushing water behind them filled their ears, and the team hurried forward. With no more offshoots nearby to duck in, the team had no choice but to run, and the rushing water flooded ever closer, until at least they were swept up by it. Pippin flew into Korrash’s pocket while Korrash and Shaelyn begin holding their breath and swimming, because the water filled the entire sewer with no pockets for air. The water battered them all over the place, and they had been carried a great distance before Korrash managed to find a handhold near the top of the sewer where there was some air, and he grabbed on with one hand while he grasped Shaelyn’s hand in the other. Pippin tried to climb up Korrash’s chest to get to the air, but he struggled greatly, and in a last-ditch effort, he cast his pixie dust onto Shaelyn, who flew so she could better position herself with her arms around Korrash’s back. This freed Korrash’s hand to life Pippin out of the water and put him on Korrash’s head, while Korrash then grabbed the handhold with both hands.

The water eventually died down, and the team rested from the ordeal before resuming their search. They eventually found a pit, and as Korrash climbed a rope down while Pippin flew, Shaelyn struggled with the slippery rope and fell down. They eventually came to a door, and after disarming a trap near the hinge, the party knew it was coming closer to its target. Ahead they heard the mutterings of three were-rats, and the party engaged them. While they were not too much trouble for the recon team, they were led by a wererat king that had hundreds of rats perpetually swarming about him. Rats bit into Shaelyn and Pippin, and though the team eventually managed to knock out their foe, Pippin this time contracted the Filth Fever. The team limped back through the sewer, delivering the Filthy Fang Gang leader to the party for questioning, who revealed on the way back that he had been hired by someone with the mark of the Unicorn on his shoulder.

It did not take long to find Darius. He was well-known enough in the seedy underbelly of Sharn; the hard part was just finding someone who wasn’t too scared of Darius to disclose his location. It seemed he had picked an old stone structure that was converted into a bar to serve as his base of operations, and in his paranoia, Darius made sure that there was only one way in and one way out.
Pippin and May’m, backed by the rest of the party, proved successful in improvising a psychic energy-filled grenade, with May’m directing her magic energies to imbuing it with pure stupefying power. Thus prepared for fighting a mob of Blood Sugar-crazed people, Pippin infiltrated the compound hiding in a person’s backpack after the party discarded an idea that involved dismantling ED-209. After a few minutes casing the joint, the party heard commotion and Korrash opened the door as ED bull-rushed whatever was behind it.

Darius and his cohorts, a mind-bending psion, a witch doctor crone, and an assassin named Shadow, would prove to be the toughest battle Zane and his as yet unnamed team have faced yet. The party started dispatching goblins in short order, but one of the first blows was struck by the psion, who caused ED to strike a great blow to the unsuspecting Zane. With clever maneuvering, Korrash and Zane were able to cut down the witch doctor at the far end of the room in short order. Darius stood firm, however, and though he was beset on all sides he was covered head to toe in armor and had few vulnerable points. His armor proved to be his undoing, because Shaelyn used his lack of mobility and conductivity to her advantage, blasting him time and again with arcane lightning. Pippin broke off to attack the psion and dealt a wicked blow, and just when the party seemed to have secured a victory, Shadow came out of hiding and stabbed May’m in the back and in one blow she collapsed. “NO!” shouted Zane, and Korrash and Zane quickly healed May’m and attacked Shadow, but Shadow was too elusive and their attacks did not find their target. Shaelyn was left with ED to battle Darius, and Pippin too, had collapsed from fighting the psion. Shaelyn was able to revive Pippin, and the party eventually dispatched the psion and Darius, while Shadow kept harassing Korrash and May’m through teleportation and trickery. Shadow fled the building, but the party caught up with her and captured her. Going along with Korrash’s repeated commands and Pippin’s assention, ED dealt the final knock-out blow, and as the party began to rest and get their bearings, Korrash secured Shadow in teleportation-restricting manacles.

Session 3: During which time Rhin reveals his skills as a chef and ED-20 psychoanalyzes his hibernation imaging.

After just a few days the makeshift crew banded together to bring their vessel into port in Sharn. Each of them kept busy, using any skills worthwhile. Shaelyn manipulated the wind and skies to fill their sails and keep them on track. Pip flitted around in and out of ED, repairing broken siding along the keel using ED’s strength and height as needed. ED was happy to lend hand, though he was wary of ocean travel. The longer he spent on the water, the more his “hibernate” mode imaging had him playing the part of an anchor, dragging along the ocean floor. Sinking, sinking into black depths where he would stay forever awake. An immobile, conscious hunk of metal growing into the coral, fish darting in and out of his rusted through body.
“Hey, ED! Can I have that turnscrewymabob?” ED snapped back to attention and handed Pip the tool he requested. He had to get off of the boat and kill something soon.

Korash removed his goggles and rubbed his mirror-like eyes. Seven hours and 32 minutes into his eight hour shift, with nothing to see but more water under the grey-blue skies. The horizon was visible, barely, becoming slightly more milky green when sky turned to ocean. A deep breath yielded more of the same scents as the days past- last night’s yellow-bellied snapfish, salt water, the tar that Pip had insisted on sloshing all over the deck. In just a few minutes, a small bright globe would rise, though stay hidden behind a thick veil of endless clouds. Then he would rest and consider his plan of attack for when they reached land. Another deep breath, was that a hint of the city? The tangy, acrid smells of a marina with a city beyond? One more night, he thought to himself, and the hunt was on.

“Ha!” Zane moved his queen into place. “And that’s mate!” Round for round, Zane and Rhin alternated besting each other on a hand carved wooden chess set that May’m had found while searching the captain’s quarters. Something you might expect someone intelligent to spend their time on, the creation of each piece from odd bits of wood and the mastery of the game. Not something you might expect from a pirate. May’m watched, strumming and tuning a small mandolin. Also hand made and found in the captain’s quarters. They each lent a hand where possible, Rhin even proved to be a more than capable cook once it fell on him to prepare the day’s catch. Suddenly, the pieces shifted as their hull scratched against a more shallow sand bar, a rook dropped to the floor, rolling. They all stood, the game forgotten- Land!

Session 2

As we left off last time, the party was getting ready to board the pirate ship that attacked the Lyrandar cruise ship. The party killed several more pirate goons before engaging the captain Warrick and his apparent superior, the masked sorcerer known as Tempest. After the fight got too real, Warrick surrendered and Tempest flew away. The party brought Warrick back to the cruise ship and threw him in the brig.

Both ships were damaged in the battle, and while fixing them the party discovered that the elemental propulsion system of the cruise ship was sabotaged. The party put a pin in that while dealing with the pirate captain on the way to shore.

The party interrogated Warrick about the attack and the stores of Blood Sugar found in the cargo hold. In exchange for freedom Warrick told us that he was only following the orders of Tempest, who is the leader of the Cloudreavers, a pirate gang from the Lhazaar Principalities. Unfortunately the party was unable to free Warrick, but Zane made a decent case for leniency for him.

When the ships reached their destination, the party started screening the passengers as they were disembarking. Eventually they discovered a doppelganger impersonating a dwarf who fessed up to the sabotage of the propulsion system. According to him, he was paid by a member of
House Orien to hit the Lyrandar shipping network. House Orien has a fierce rivalry with House Lyrandar, whose airshipping industry Orien believes is infringing upon their overland transportation business.

Session 1

The fluff takes longer than I expected, so I’ll do the abbreviated version first:

The whole party met together for thee first time in a meeting room brawl, when one meeting participant (whom we’ll call Abe) suddenly attacked another person, one Captain d’Orien. The party defeated and captured Abe and learned that he has an aberrant dragonmark and was paid a large sum of gold, presumably for the assassination.

The party decided to work together to solve this mystery, but before they could get very far they heard an alert that a large storm was coming. Attempts at outrunning or deflecting the storm failed and the party soon found out that the storm was part of a pirate attack. A wave of pirates boarded the cruise ship, creating chaos among the passengers and crew. The party jumped into action and fought back against the pirates, clearing the upper deck.

When we left off, the party was heading down to the main deck where the pirates were boarding from and noticed a pair of interesting people on the pirate ship that they think might be directing this attack.

Dun dun duuuun.

Fluffy stuff:
As the Lyrandar cruise ship The Seaward blew its final boarding whistle, Shaelyn d’Lyrandar wondered if her friends had all managed to safely (and quietly) make it aboard. This was her final voyage as Windwrightpprentice to Loraste, and she would rather not spend it making excuses for a couple feylings and their warforged pet.

“Get your head out of the clouds, Shaelyn!” hollered a familiar, gruff voice, startling Shaelyn. “This trip is your final exam, so make it a good one. Now, what do you make of that cloud formation?” Shaelyn put the thoughts of her friends away and got to work. If she was going to become a proper Windwright she could have no distractions.

“Oof! Hey, stop bouncing around so much! Things are pretty cramped here as it is without—are you even listening to me, ED? You didn’t shut down again did you? ED! Hey! Listen!"

“We started moving,” grumbled the slow, monotone voice of Content Not Found: ed-209, having heard about enough of the other voice inside of him for one trip. ED, a very large warforged, wondered why he ever agreed to stow away in such a small crate.

“Oh, excellent. Let’s get out of here then. Just lift the top of—Woah, be careful!” shouted the first voice as ED-209 jerked up, breaking out of the wooden crate he was in. After brushing off the pieces of wood, a hatch opened up in his chest and the pixie Pippin Eventide flew out, rubbing the new bump on his head. “Not the way I would have done it, but I admire your enthusiasm. Well I guess our grand infiltration is complete, so…where to?”

After a few moments of ED’s blank stare, Pippin says, “Oh well, have it your way—I’m going exploring. Try not to break anything…else. Remember what we promised Shaelyn: best behavior. I’ll find you later, so just try to have some fun!” And with that, Pippin flew up and our of the nearest vent out of the cargo hold.

ED-209 only sighed.

Rhin was finding his new job exceptionally easy. Navigating a crowded ballroom full of excited passengers, with a tray of filled glasses in one hand, was nothing compared to chasing prey through the forest at a full sprint while aiming and firing his longbow. Despite what Shaelyn said, the only interesting part of the job so far was watching the less graceful waiters stumble and try to catch their drinks. But at least the tips were good. And he was starting to get control over his seasickness.

Meanwhile, in a quiet entertainment lounge on the upper decks…
The drone of idle gossip and the clinking glasses of well aged port was like a lullaby. May’m swallowed a yawn behind her decorative fan as General Richard d’Orien waxed on endlessly about his latest financial venture: investing in an expedition to learn more about the southern gnomes harvesting kawkaw beans, the newest rage in hot drinks amongst the fashionable of Sharn. The ostrich feathers tickled her nose. Her eyes watered with the effort to keep them open. Zane cleared his throat loudly, in a polite “Wake up, idiot” sort of way. In response, May’m blinked rapidly several times and sat up straight, trying to bring her focus back to Richard.

“…apparently palatable with enough sugar and cream. I said to Billy, ‘You can’t just pay the gnomes, the plantations will not be nearly efficient enough. You have to put elementals in place…’” Richard’s cousin, Korbin “Billy” Bilirubin d’Orien II, was the third highest ranking member of the House Orien. May’m was listening now. She and Zane exchanged a brief look that confirmed that he too was listening closely to glean more information about the possible mastermind behind the House Orien transportation conspiracy. Said conspirator would be joining them for sup and a hand of cards within the hour. Noting the time, May’m excused herself to powder her nose, lowering into a curtsy to fluff the General’s ego somewhat to make up for her brief lack of fawning over the last hour. The tightly laced bodice that revealed just enough, tasteful decolletage from behind the burgundy lace did not hurt, either. The General stood as she rose and passed her white gloved hand to Zane’s, “Keep her out of trouble for me, old boy.”
“Aye, sir.”
“Dickie, really, how much trouble could I find in the powder room?” Zane held his face stoically for all of 60 seconds before muttering under his breath. May’m didn’t catch all of it, something about the time in Kartush where he happened upon her dispatching a team of monk assassins in the public bath house of the local temple.
“Hush, ‘old boy,’ not everyone needs to hear that particular story. As I recall, you were the one who waltzed in after I cleaned up the mess you made with the High Priestess Timwa.” Zane grimaced at the derogatory nickname the General had taken to using for him. As if “General” was anything more than a family-bought-and-paid-for-never-seen-real-action title.
As for the task at hand, "May, we have come pretty far in this endeavor allowing the General to inflate his importance to the role of co-conspirator. If he wants to call me “boy” and hand me his inside information on a silver platter, I will answer gladly. Now, let’s go over this one more time…" The two conversed almost silently on the trip to and from the ladies’ water closet, rehashing their plans to further investigate and infiltrate House Orien. Just before coming within earshot of Richard, Zane squeeze May’m’s wrist until she turned sharply to greet his gaze. “Now, do not react to this.” She instantly exhaled, allowing her shoulders to drop and glanced away from her long time partner. “I have the feeling that you and your General are being surveyed. I have not yet seen the culprit but I want you to keep your guard up. Do you have your pins?” He refered to the poison tipped hair pins, lovely ivory darts that held her hair in elaborate waves of braids, in keeping with the latest from Sharn. Jet and ebony darts also made up the boning of her corset. Other weapons were hidden even further from view.
“Of course.” Her skirts swept the gleaming oak as they returned to the green felt gaming table where Dickie sat swirling a glass of liquid amber.
“Here you are, sir,” Zane assisted May’m to her seat next, “No trouble to be had this time.”
“Good man, we were about to deal our first hand.”
“Excellent,” May rubbed her hands together, anticipating more than cards, “Let the games begin.”